Amare è dolce ancora più del miele
by dancesabove
Summary: The title means "For love is even sweeter than honey," a line from La Bohème. A description of Dody McCleland's night of love with Chief Inspector Matthew Pike. A sort of "possible chapter" between the final chapter and the epilogue of "Antidote to Murder."


**Title:** _Amare è dolce ancora più del miele_

(For love is even sweeter than honey)

**Author:** dancesabove

**Disclaimer:** The creative rights to the characters and plot lines in _Antidote to Murder_ (and in _The Anatomy of Death_ and _The Scent of Murder_) belong to Felicity Young, but no infringement is intended and I in no way profit from the story I've written.

**Rating:** M

**Pairing:** Dr Dody McCleland and Chief Inspector Matthew Pike

**A/N:** I've looked forward to each new book in the Dr Dody McCleland mystery/crime series created by Felicity Young. Fe has said that she might have based the character of Matthew Pike on an actor I greatly admire—one who famously portrays another policeman (at another stage of life) in "Foyle's War."

But I'd be enamored of her work regardless; she obviously does diligent research to capture the specific police and coroner's procedures and events of the early 20th century. But most of all I love the characters she has created. I find even the "supporting cast" very well painted, and enjoy Dody's interactions with those closest to her. In addition to engaging mysteries, Young creates lovely sexual tension between Dody and Matthew. I wrote to tell the author that, with each novel, I simply don't want the story to come to an end.

In that spirit, I went on to describe what might have occurred between the final chapter and the epilogue of Felicity's second book, _Antidote to Murder._

Dody's sister is away for the evening when Matthew Pike comes to see her after a particularly harrowing adventure they've shared. Dody's maid, Annie, has gone to bed. Dody found Matthew somewhat reluctant to become involved with her unless they were married, but finally he has acquiesced. That sexual tension at last is resolved… 'til the next time, anyway! : )

* * *

Dody wondered as Matthew gently removed her necklace what had made him change his mind and accept the idea of them as lovers without marriage. It very probably was the terrible close call she'd had… it had in some ways made her own mind begin to work in the opposite direction. What would it be like, to be his wife? He understood the importance of her career, and of her family, no matter what their offbeat convictions. He seemed not to be put off by her age and her lack of Florence-like beauty. She could see herself living the rest of her life with this brave, gentle, tormented man. She wanted to spend as much time as she could lessening that torment.

But all that mattered at this moment was that his mouth was again warm and hungrily demanding upon hers, and this time he was not halting the eager exploration of her hands as she loosened his tie and undid each button of his waistcoat.

Dody felt an unprecedented rush of heat through her body as he wove his hand into her hair and softly opened her lips with his tongue. She cracked open her eyes at the very moment he did; the cool blue of his irises had turned a much deeper shade and they were fogged with desire.

After several moments of fervent kissing she felt her legs weaken so that all she could do to keep standing was wind her arms about his neck and hang on for dear life.

Matthew drew back his head for a moment, breathing hard. He arched one eyebrow at her.

"Perhaps the bed would be…" he glanced at it behind her.

Dody nodded and turned to walk towards it, loosening her waistband and stays. But suddenly she felt less sure of herself.

She sat on the edge for a moment, looking dazed. He removed cufflinks and began to detach his collar, but looked up to see her slightly worried expression.

He knelt before her. "Dody. My darling? Have you ev— is this all new for you?"

She nodded, trying not to blush. "I know it's ridic—"

Matthew placed two fingers over her lips. "I don't want you even to think that. It means you never took this lightly, and that you and I are about to share something very special. My only unhappiness is that…" He trailed off.

"It could hurt me, I know…" she said, ironically feeling an odd kind of reassurance. Perhaps due to the realisation that she was the physiologist, and had the understanding of all that would happen. Or _might_ happen. She remembered the blood she had seen in her undergarments well before the onset of her menses, after her tussle in the sand with Florence when they were children. Perhaps her hymen had been broken then, and this would not be painful.

She embraced him as he leant close, his dear face filled with sympathy and concern.

"We may not have cause to be worried, though, Pike. Childhood horseplay. We'll just have to see." She caressed his cheek. "Even if I have pain, I want this. You are the man I love. I treasure you. And I want you."

His eyes grew large and even more full of emotion as he lay her down across the eiderdown. He helped her off with her skirt and parted her shirtwaist.

"You're calmer," he observed as he gathered her into his arms and looked searchingly into her eyes. "Was it… thinking about things in a more scientific way?"

She gave him a radiant smile. How clever he was, or perhaps: How well he knew her, above all others. And his understanding and gentleness made her want to cry, she was so touched.

"I suppose it takes just a bit of the grand romance out of things," she said apologetically.

Pike gave her a twinkling sort of look that was amused and fond at the same time; she interpreted it to mean that she needn't worry about any nervousness. Later she learned what he really had thought; that it was quintessentially his Dody to be analytical—so it could never ruin for him their attraction and shared emotion.

"Romance," he whispered as he kissed her hair. "Hmm." Next her temple, her cheek, the very edge of her mouth. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to the sweetness of these affectionate little kisses. Then, humming in a low tone, he lowered his lips to her neck.

From books Dody had gleaned that attraction made one want to be near the man to whom one was drawn; made a woman want to feel his kiss and his caresses and the union of his body with hers. Nowhere in her readings had she come across information about how stimulating it could be to feel the mouth of said man upon one's bared throat, pressing his lips to the skin in light kisses and licks, then softly biting. Close to her ear was Matthew's growl of contentment from breathing in her delicate scent. It made a hot thrill rush throughout her body, and she found herself twisting her hips upward towards his thigh, trying to get it closer to the rapidly warming area between her legs. The sudden hot slickness there rather surprised her; she had a bad moment of wondering if her monthly had come at an unexpected time, perhaps in response to all the tension over the last few days.

Tentatively she reached down into her drawers to touch what she was experiencing, and her hand came away wet, a little sticky, but (thank Heaven!) not bloody. Matthew watched her examine her fingers and then shocked her by tenderly pouncing on them with his mouth, then licking them clean.

"I knew you would taste so very sweet…" he murmured, his eyes looking sleepily into hers with tender lust.

Dody's gasp was lost in his next kiss, a long, deep exploration of her mouth that left her breathless and boneless. What was this? Nothing she knew as a doctor and expert on physiology, and nothing she had felt when touching herself privately had ever prepared her for the intensity of this pleasure. And he hadn't even finished undressing her!

When he drew back from the kiss she tilted her head back and gave a long, ragged moan of pure frustration as he set about the laborious process of divesting her of the corset she wore. The urgent need to feel his skin on hers made her eagerly help him with the complicated undergarments, and then with the rest of his clothing.

Matthew couldn't meet her eyes as he lay beside her after revealing the long, ugly scar at his knee, but she made a point of tenderly fingering the gash, trying to communicate to him that it did not mar his beauty to her. Far more fascinating to her at the moment was the hard bulge she could see in his shorts; this she certainly had read about, and seen detailed diagrams of. Here in relation to an actual man, however, it was something of a size she was not sure her body would find easy to accommodate. She took a very deep breath and moved her hand slowly up his leg until she was skimming her palm over the tented cloth. He shut his eyes and made a quiet hissing sound, his breathing uneven and his fingers playing with her hair as she tentatively explored him.

Dody's eyes became wider as she realised her ministrations were making him larger and harder still, and just as she thought about helping him remove the shorts, he stilled her hand.

"Darling girl. Wait… please. If you continue, we may find I've finished before I can begin."

She lifted her eyes to his and melted at the steady, loving look she saw there.

Matthew rolled over her, propping himself on his elbows and continuing to study her face. She wondered how she looked to him. Foolish and naïve? Frightened? She consciously tried not to have such a wide-eyed expression, but it was after all genuine wonder that she felt, at the sensation of his hands combing through the hair at each side of her head, cradling it with such care.

He kissed her ear and again nuzzled her neck before moving lower and placing the lightest of touches with his lips upon one of her taut nipples. As if he had read her mind, he remarked quietly, "Beautiful. You look so lovely."

Dody could not decide which was having the greater effect on her equilibrium… his crisp, sweet voice praising her, or the acute stimulation of his lips as they brushed over her sensitive breasts. She writhed luxuriantly with arousal, then cried out as he increased his tongue's pressure just a little and then softly sucked one trembling nipple into the shelter of his warm mouth.

"Aaauuung, Matthew…" she moaned, eyes tightly closed as she bucked up and off the mattress, her fingers lacing through his hair.

"Mmm, yes? What is it, my love?" he gently teased, shifting to avoid any more stimulation to his groin for the moment, as her excitement was creating an even greater surge of desire within him.

Dody tried to concentrate on the smooth skin of his shoulders and back as she caressed him, but the more he worshipped her with his mouth, the less she could even process a thought; he kept spiralling her into bliss as he suckled and kissed.

Eventually the ache between her legs had become so acute that she stopped his head and looked beseechingly into his eyes. "Pike! I'm ready. Please..."

His eyes widened at the urgency of her tone, but instead of moving back upward as she expected, he ducked his head and began to kiss her abdomen and the lush softness of her thigh, using one gentling hand to part her legs.

She stopped him. "Matthew, um... what are—?"

He raised his head and tilted it in the most beguiling way. She felt her heart stop at the understanding in his smile. "Let me try this. A more intimate kind of kiss. If you don't like it, just push my shoulder, and I'll stop. But I think it will make the next step a little... easier for you." His mouth tugged mischievously at one corner and he returned to his task.

"OhdearGod," she said in surprise as she felt his tongue along her quivering opening. With a low moan in his throat he gave long caressing licks of her nether lips, each one having the effect on her of a light electric shock. She found herself arcing upward off the bed as if he could be any closer. His hands braced her pelvis as his tongue explored further and she thought she would lose her mind. Her hands left his head and she stretched them upward along the bed in abandon as he smiled and continued to drink of her, employing his fingers as well until she gasped and then keened with the intensity of her orgasm.

By the time she had regained her normal pace of breathing he was beside her again, fingers stroking her cheek, his eyes quite dark. Dody glanced down to see the evidence of his patience.

Pike moved back over her until she could feel the strange velvety hardness pressed tightly between them, and she watched carefully as he reached down to align himself, sensuously moving his tip down over her clitoris and then between her glistening labia. Now he was poised right at her entrance.

The expression on his face was one of great love mixed with an apology for any pain he might cause her. He slowly lowered his head and kissed her deeply, and just as she was becoming lost in that sensation, he pushed his way into her.

Dody could feel a bit of friction that made her tense, and after he'd groaned with the exhilaration of being gripped by that tightness, he placed his hands on her hips and whispered, "Try to relax, Dody. That's it, sweet; for now, let the muscles loosen, if you can."

She bit back annoyance that he was telling _her,_ the doctor, what to do, but she complied and was rewarded with a unique sensation of warmth and a tingle of pleasure; she had a mental image of a honey wand with its wooden replica of a tiny hive, suspended with warm honey dripping from it...

He kept up his mapping of her body with his hands, the look of awe in his eyes bringing her near to tears each time she caught it.

Instead of finding confidence in her knowledge of the body's ways of responding, she found herself experiencing a transporting sense of emotion. She knew all at once that she always would be in love with Matthew Pike, he of the measured, polite questions; the ability to wield rapier when she wasn't hearing him out; the kind and quiet voice; the soulful eyes. What she was feeling now was not textbook physical arousal leading to climax, she unconsciously realised. It was like the rise of the music when Nellie Melba sang with her Rodolfo in La Bohème, the beautiful climb the swelling orchestration took along with her soaring voice, and then Dody heard her own voice soaring in a clamour of passion as this man brought her to the most exquisite pinnacle she had ever felt, making her entire body shudder with ecstasy and with adoration for him.

His voice joined hers in joyous cries as seconds after her release, she felt his.

She held back from saying 'I love you.' She was not sure where they stood; whether that would make him feel guilt about their not being married. But much more of this sort of thing, and she would have a very hard time imagining her life without him, whatever else she was pursuing.

Reflecting on what he had confided to her earlier that week, she said softly, "How could any wife of yours seek the company of some other man?"

He smiled modestly, but his eyes held something other than amusement as they looked deeply into hers.

"Because there is so much more than 'this' to the bond between a man and a woman. And the more there is aside from this, the more important and intense this aspect becomes."

As she lay in Matthew's arms, pondering his words, Dody dozed lightly, comforted by the sounds of Matthew's even breaths beside her. She felt such contentment; so safe, so cared for.

After perhaps twenty minutes had passed, she felt Matthew stir beside her, gently pulling away from their entwined limbs.

"Mmmaaww," Dody said incoherently, then more clearly: "Matthew…?"

"I must go, love. It wouldn't do for Florence to return and find me here, or the neighbours to see me leave as they return from a party. I must protect you." He gathered his clothes from where they had been strewn.

"But Florence—"

"Yes, I realize Florence has every expectation that I am here with you." Dody could see the colour rise in his face in the dim light. "But the conventions must be maintained. For you, my sweet."

"But when?"

"I don't know," he replied, bending over her to kiss her gently on the lips, "But soon, I hope."


End file.
